


once it's on the paper, we feel better (it's like some kind of clarity)

by leifstroganoff



Category: Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist (TV)
Genre: (oh my god they were roommates), 5+1, Childhood Friends, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Pining, Roommates, our poor boys are simply idiots who ignore their feelings until they're too strong to ignore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-13
Updated: 2020-05-13
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:34:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24156700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leifstroganoff/pseuds/leifstroganoff
Summary: 5 times Leif writes about Tobin in his journal + 1 time Tobin reads his gushing
Relationships: Tobin Batra & Leif Donnelly, Tobin Batra/Leif Donnelly
Comments: 4
Kudos: 47





	once it's on the paper, we feel better (it's like some kind of clarity)

1.

High school is _tough_. Leif isn’t the first or the last person to hate high school, but he certainly feels it strongly in the moment as he eats lunch in his favorite teacher’s classroom. Well, as he does homework and happens to have an inedible school lunch sitting on the same desk. It’s not that he doesn’t have friends or that he doesn’t want to eat in the cafeteria, it’s just that all of his friends are on a field trip that his parents wouldn’t pay for or sign the permission slip for. And maybe he doesn’t want to eat in the cafeteria, anyways.

He’s not _lonely_ (or at least that’s what he’d say if you asked him), he just feels like it’s much less of a loser move to eat alone in Mr. Warren’s classroom than alone in the cafeteria, and one of those options left him open to far less criticism and/or mocking from his peers. If you asked him, he would say he’s doing homework, but anyone (though his teacher is the only one to bear witness) can see that a leather-bound journal is sitting on top of his pre-calc equations, sprawling handwriting talking about how much he wishes he’d just stayed home today, but at least he got a text from his long-distance best friend and that made him feel better. He’d never admit it, but the rest of that page is filled with a small sketch of him and his friend and _several_ sentences about how he’s the only one there for him when he really needs it and that he makes him feel like he belongs somewhere. He doesn’t even think about touching those feelings with a 6-foot pole for another several years.

2.

He continues keeping journals through college and getting a reliable job and Tobin getting the same job; if it fills him with a feeling he doesn’t quite wanna dissect when he realizes that they’ll be able to work together and _really_ hang out outside of Skype and voice calls and multiplayer games, he does exactly what he thinks he should and ignores the _hell_ out of that feeling. He thinks he might have to acknowledge the feeling, though, when Tobin very excitedly suggests that they should just get an apartment together to make living in the city cheaper and, well, he can’t really argue with that _or_ the fact that the thought of sharing a domestic space with Tobin leaves his stomach in utter knots.

So, he does what he does when he doesn’t know how to process a complex feeling like this; he writes it down. And before he’s actually realized what he’s doing, he has three full pages of himself gushing about how important Tobin is to him and how he’s never felt out of place when Tobin is by his side and how as soon as they moved into their apartment it felt like a _home_ (and he chooses not to acknowledge the subconsciously doodled hearts in the margins). He stares at the journal for what seems like an hour before he closes it, sets it aside, and decides that’s a problem for a Leif that cares much more about regulating his emotions. For now, he’s going to go out into the living room and watch Tobin crush some missions on the Batman game he’s been playing and then they’ll go to bed and go to work and he wouldn’t think at all about the butterflies floating around in his gut. 

3\. 

The next ‘major Tobin event’ for him isn’t one that he expects at all.

The latest page of his journal simply reads ‘ _Tobin kissed my forehead last night????????’._

They’ve been working and living together for a few years now and it isn’t that unusual for them to spend Saturday nights hanging out, drinking, watching movies, and/or playing games. It’s become a kind of routine for them, if neither of them have anything better to do, to just spend time together and hang out. So, that’s what they had done the night before. Shots of fireball, shitty music, and a version of Settlers of Catan they’d made up to make a ‘fair’ two player game was a pretty good saturday night, in Leif’s humble opinion.

So, when Leif lost the game, horribly, he didn’t even care; usually, he would sulk or find a reason that Tobin didn’t _really_ win (‘I mean, dude, dev card victory points _barely_ count’). But several shots of fireball were sitting warm in his stomach and Tobin’s smile was beaming as he turned over the two victory point cards he’d been hanging onto for the entire game and Leif thought maybe he’d just give him this one, because maybe he wanted to see that smile light up the room more than he’d ever wanted to. For the first time, in his slightly fuzzy alcohol-addled haze, he decided he might have to confront the feelings that made his heart tight and his stomach flip, because there was no denying now that those were a direct result of the warmth emanating from his best friend.

As they put the game away and moved to the couch, turning on a shitty lifetime movie, Leif couldn’t help but to watch his best friend. As he looked at him, he realized that, while he wasn’t necessarily doing anything noteworthy, he was utterly perfect. It wasn’t that he was great or beautiful or anything special at all, it was that he was _Tobin_ and he was in front of him, laughing and cracking jokes at the attorney-client drama playing on the TV, and he was _real_ and he cared about him and Leif’s stomach was exploding in warmth that matched Tobin’s 1000-watt smile.

“Hey,” Leif’s voice was soft, with something he might describe as longing sneaking in in spite of himself. “You know you’re my favorite person in the world, right?”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“You, too.” 

Leif’s soft smile met a slightly confused look in Tobin’s eyes before they both turned back towards the TV, settling into a comfortable silence for the night. Before long, Leif had slumped over onto the armrest, sleep coming in to claim him. The last thing he remembers is Tobin adjusting him so that he’s laying down, throwing a blanket over him, and, after a second’s hesitation, leaning down and pressing his lips tenderly to his forehead.

4.

_Dear journal,_ (because it’s a journal, dude, seriously)

_I think I’m in love with my best friend. What the fuck do I do with that?_

5.

The next time he writes about Tobin, it just reads “ _So, uh?? We’re dating??”_

Leif had come home the day before and nervously asked if they could talk about something serious; Tobin had responded with a joke, before seeing that Leif was too anxious to actually find it funny, leading him to think this must be some actual serious stuff.

“Uh, okay. What’s up, bro?” They both sat down on the couch as an uncomfortable tension threatened to choke through the room.

“I just, um… the other night. We were hanging out and we were really close and you seemed to - I don’t know, it seemed like we were comfortable, like, hanging on each other and being… _close_ like that. Did I read that wrong?” 

Tobin’s eyes drew suspiciously over him as he asked. “Yeah, I’m comfortable being touch-y with you, if that’s what you’re - are you worried you made me uncomfortable, dude?”

“Uh, yeah?” Leif’s eyes met Tobin’s for the first time since he’d entered the apartment, apologetic and concerned and so, so soft. “I’m…” He looked down at his hands, tension drawing heavy between his shoulders as he drew in a deep breath. “I’m just gonna say what I’ve been thinking about, because if I don’t, I think I’m gonna literally combust and I’m really tired of this stupid lump in my throat and ache in my chest everytime I-”

“Dude,” Tobin cut him off, placing a hand carefully on his knee. “You can tell me anything.”

“I think I like you. Like, a lot, in a not-bromantic way, like in a _really, really_ romantic way. And I get it if you don’t feel the same way or if this makes things weird or if you need space, I just - I needed you to know and I needed not to be -”

Tobin cut him off for the second time in so much as a minute, this time by leaning in and brushing their lips together instead of a soft ‘dude’. Though, the ‘dude’ did come a second later when they pulled away from each other. 

“So, does that mean -”

“Yes, that means _I like you, too_ , dumbass. That means _it’s about time_ one of us did something about it. So, thanks for that.” 

Leif couldn’t help the smile that spread itself across his face at that, leaning in for another chaste kiss. When they pulled away, their smiles reflected each other, hands resting on each other’s chests, hearts beating from adrenaline, relief, _affection_. 

+1 

Tobin comes into the living room holding two takeout containers stacked on top of each other; Tuesday night has become their ‘treat ourselves to shitty chinese takeout’ night, so they’re doing just that. He sets the containers down, moving to gather the junk spread out across their coffee table so that they can use it to eat. Some papers, some game controllers, the remote, Leif’s sketchbook, and Leif’s journal open to a page that shows a rough sketch of what really looks like the two of them, encompassed in a heart and several sentences underneath it gushing about how special he wanted to make their anniversary because _Tobin is special_ _and he deserves to know that I love him_.

“Aw, babe, what’s this?”

“Huh?” Leif emerges from the kitchen carrying two cans of soda, confusion etched onto his face before his eyes focus on the journal in Tobin’s hand. “That’s nothing, I just -”

“You love me?” 

“I, uh - yeah.” Leif’s cheeks are now bright red, sodas set down on the coffee table. “I was kinda hoping me saying that would be a lot less anticlimactic than this, but, uh… I do. I love you, a lot.”

“That’s so cute. You have a _crush_ on me.”

“Tobin, we’ve been dating for almost a year.”

“ _Still…”_ Tobin laughs and smiles, grabbing Leif’s hand and pulling him close enough to press a soft kiss against his lips. “I love you, too, y’know?”

**Author's Note:**

> this has been a wip for quite a bit and i got hit with a lot of inspo today and wrote most of it in one go so i hope it doesnt suck lmao  
> leave comments if you wanna make me really really happy :D


End file.
